Stepmom, Son, a Love Motel
Amanda didn’t want to believe in fate, but she did want to believe in family. A quick look at the course her life had taken might tempt a person to view events through a fateful lens. Married at 19, widowed with his two kids by the time she was 23, a grandmother before she was 30. Her family life wasn’t exactly conventional. It seemed life kept throwing her one unexpected curve after another.
Daniel never really gave it much thought. At 18, he was just starting out, with the long road ahead. Sometimes he wondered if life had a plan for him, or what that plan might be, but he tended to live more in the moment.
No matter the circumstances, Amanda tried to take control. Sometimes, however, she got the sneaking suspicion that control is just an illusion. Take the mating instinct, for example. That damn thing had a way of nagging at her, and not taking “No” for an answer. Was biology just another form of destiny?
The way they figured it, the trip from Northern Michigan to the San Francisco Bay Area should take about 36 hours, alternating drivers and stopping only for bathroom breaks. Daniel was moving out West to go to school, and Amanda, his stepmother, would help him drive his car out there and then fly back.
She could have let him drive himself. That’s what he wanted. But to do that he would have needed to get a hotel at some point, or else—and this is what Amanda assumed he’d do—try to do it without sleep, like most 18-year-olds, thinking he was immortal. She wanted him safe. Plus it would have seemed a little cold to send him off by himself. And a little shared adventure to mark the occasion of Daniel starting out on his own—and Amanda having an empty nest—just kind of felt right.
It had been seven years since Daniel’s dad died, and three years since his older sister Tessa moved out for college. Amanda certainly never planned on spending her 20’s raising two kids alone that weren’t even hers by blood, but those were the cards she’d been dealt. Their biological mother had also been taken from them far too soon. So when David died, Amanda was all those kids had, and she stepped up and took care of them as if they were her own, even if in some ways she’d been more like a big sister, as she’d been mistaken for on more than one occasion.
Amanda was only 30. Still in her prime. She kept herself in great shape. She drew a fair amount of attention from men, of all ages really, including Daniel’s friends. She was naturally blonde with striking pale gray eyes, and petite, still more cute than beautiful, although maturing very nicely. Her face had not grown harder, but somehow softer, wiser, and more kind. She radiated a relaxed and assured goodness.
Yet for all that, she did have her doubts and demons. It was probably a good thing Daniel was moving out.
Daniel was dark-haired, like his father. He had broad shoulders and was a little taller than average. He was great with math, good enough to earn a partial academic scholarship. He was not great with girls. The pieces were all there, but he lacked confidence. Nothing that a little experience couldn’t cure. Daniel did have one girlfriend in high school, but that only lasted a couple of months before graduation.